Aldrich Ames, the former CIA counterintelligence officer who became one of the most damaging American double agents in history, has died at the age of 84.

He passed away on Monday at the Federal Correctional Institution in Cumberland, Maryland, where he was serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole, CBS News reported.

Betrayal and Arrest

Ames was jailed on 28 April 1994 after admitting to selling secret information to the Soviet Union and later Russia, compromising more than 100 clandestine operations. His betrayal exposed over 30 CIA spies in the Soviet Union, leading to the deaths of at least 10 intelligence assets.

Seeking money to pay mounting debts, Ames began providing the KGB with names of CIA spies in April 1985, receiving an initial payment of $50,000. Over the next nine years, he admitted to receiving roughly $2.5 million in total.

His code name with the KGB was Kolokol (The Bell). Ames later recalled:

“To my enduring surprise, the KGB replied that it had set aside for me $2 million in gratitude for the information.”

The money funded a lavish lifestyle, including a Jaguar car, foreign holidays, and a $540,000 house, despite his CIA salary never exceeding $70,000 a year.

Career and Personal Life

Ames’ 31-year CIA career began in 1962, aided by his father, an agency analyst. He married his first wife, Nancy Segebarth, in 1969. After assignments in Turkey and later Mexico City, Ames struggled with alcohol problems and personal issues.

While in Mexico City, he met Maria del Rosario Casas Dupuy, his second wife, a Colombian embassy cultural attaché and CIA asset who would later be charged as his accomplice.

By 1983, Ames was head of the CIA’s Soviet counterintelligence department, despite ongoing concerns about his behavior. His growing debts and lifestyle pressures led him to sell secrets for financial gain, as FBI agent Leslie G Wiser described:

“It was about the money, and I don’t think he ever really tried to lead anybody to believe it was anything more than that.”

Espionage Timeline

• 1985: Began spying for the KGB.
• 1985–1994: Provided sensitive intelligence, including names of CIA assets.
• 1994: Arrested on 21 February after an intensive mole hunt.

Ames’ second wife, Rosario, admitted to knowing about his espionage activities and was released after five years as part of a plea deal.

Legacy

CIA Director at the time, R. James Woolsey, called Ames:

“A malignant betrayer of his country.”

Woolsey added that the agents Ames betrayed died because a ‘murdering traitor wanted a bigger house and a Jaguar.'”

Ames’ espionage remains one of the most devastating breaches of US intelligence during the Cold War.